around the world in 180 days

Before we left Invercargill yesterday, we stopped by the DOC office and had a lovely conversation with an older lady who worked there. She told us that the Rees-Dart trek is her 2nd favorite, second to the Routeburn, which is one of the great walks and is completely booked. She also showed us a weather report, which said, in her words, that the air was turning to custard.
Apparently custard means rain in Kiwi-speak, because that’s exactly what it did, messing about with it in the afternoon, on again/off again, before settling in for a good long soak last night. The weather report looked terrible for the whole week.
Lucky for us, Rich, who we stayed with in  Wellington (thanks Beth!!), knew a very nice lady who lives in Te Anau, the gateway to the Milford Sound, one of the most beautiful and heavily visited areas of NZ. Her name is LIsa and she was kind enough to let us sleep in her spare bedroom. We’re staying at her house again tonight and, as it’s supposed to snow in the mountains and hail everywhere, we’re very grateful for her hospitality.
We spent today driving up to Milford Sound and doing day-hikes to the sides. We were ready for rain, since the air had turned to custard, but when we woke up, the sun was peeking through the clouds and there were large patches of blue sky. We took off from Lisa’s house as early as we could, determined to make the most of what little nice weather we had, expecting it to start raining at any moment.
It did rain, off and on, but for a region that gets 7 meters of rain annually (about 24 feet for us Americans) we didn’t do too bad. We made it up to Key Summit, which is a short piece along the Routeburn track, and had great mountain views in all directions. Once we were satisfied, we booked back down the hill and headed to Lake Marian, a glacial lake we could see in the distance. Two hours later, we stood on the shore, after a rough, rocky and very wet climb. The scenery was amazing, as beautiful as anything I’ve ever seen. In some ways, it reminds me of Alaska, but in some ways, it’s even more dramatic. The cliff faces are vertical in a lot of places–you can see tiny streams falling and falling down the face of the cliffs, tumbling from as high as you can see to below your feet. I tried to take some photos, but a camera can’t capture something that tremendously huge. I guess that parts of the Lord of the Rings trilogy were filmed somewhere around here, and the Southern Alps (the range we were hiking in today) was used for the Misty Mountains.
We felt pretty lucky to have such great weather after expecting to be hiking in rain. We covered two long day-hikes that we probably wouldn’t have even tried if it had been raining and we were rewarded with amazing views. Today kind of made up for that miserable hike up the Tongariro Crossing a while back. Hopefully the weather will clear for us and our trip along the Ress/Dart will be in good weather. Fingers crossed.

We hardly did anything today. We drove about 150 km,ending up in Invercargill, and saw a waterfall and a bog lake and went grocery shopping. Neither one of us slept well last night, as it was cold. Not MN cold, of course, but probably lower 40’s. Our bags are rated to 55 degrees, and they don’t really mummy up. Anna wore three shirts, long underwear, wool socks and her skirt. Today we bought her a $15 sleeping bag and me a $6 fleece blanket. We also got a cabin for tonight.
For the last few days, we’ve been trying to figure out what our other big NZ overnight trip is going to be. We realized that we only have 12 days left before we fly to SYD and lots left we want to do. A 4 day trip is 1/3 of that, a big commitment. Two trips of that length would mean missing a large area of the island.
Besides that, hiking is the bread and butter of NZ tourism and it’s priced as such. Huts on the great walks are $30 per person, per night, so for the 3 night trek we’re looking at, it’d cost us $180, plus transport costs. For hiking. The Great Walks are through some of the best scenery and have the best services–transport to and from the track, maps, etc–and are thus the most tempting. There are a few other tracks that are more difficult, both in terms of the hike itself and in terms of getting to the beginning and end and in between, but they’re not in the most prime locations and whatnot.
I think we’ve decided, though, to hike elsewhere. We’re looking at an alpine track called the Rees-Dart track, which follows the Ress river up, crosses Rees saddle at 1450 meters, and then comes down along the Dart river. It’s a 4 day trek, with day 2 having most of the ups and a good chunk of the downs. There’s 1000 meters of elevation gain, and a lady told us that after one of the uphill sections, you can’t see where you started because it’s so steep. There’s also knee deep mud if it’s been rainy and no available water on the alpine section (shich is mercifully brief). The plus is that, being more rugged, it is less used and just as beautiful as any of the great walks.
Wilderness in NZ (and probably much of the rest of the world) just isn’t enjoyed in solitude and, while we haven’t been overwhelmed with people, there are times when I just want to do a hike and not see anyone else for a half hour or so. With luck, this Rees-Dart track will give us that. Also with luck, we’ll actually be able to hike it.

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